Hill running and Libertable: Dahlia (updated)

Today I did hills. Yesterday, I just did not want to move and wondered why I run at the beginning, which went away after less than 2 km. Today the knees were sore from the beginning, but got fine pretty quick. I ran through the regular neighborhood ringed by Yotsu Sanchome, Yotsu, Akasakamitsuke, and Shinanomachi stations. Instead trying to add hills, I just did some loops to use the ones I like more. Seemed to work.

Went to Libertable for cake. Despite being right on my usual path, I've only got cake there twice before. Both times, it was high-quality cake that I never want to have again. The first was Luxe, which is chocolate mousse with black truffles; very interesting, and I'm not sorry that I tried it, but it's not for me. The second was Robuste, with is a disk on edge, with hazelnut praline, chocolate, and almond, but the banana and passion fruit inside did not really do it for me (bananas are for breakfast to me, not for my cake, although I've got my eye on a rum, banana, custard tart recipe). This time I was going for the Zenith, figuring if I didn't like that, then I'd call it quits for them (although it's been at least a year anyway). That was not there at 8:30 or so; they are open until 9 pm, which is great, and they had multiple customers in front of me and a lot of people were coming down from the big, obvious rich shrine across the street, whose well-lit, tall, high-quality stone stairs I selfishly ran up and down a couple times, though mostly by the side paths, not the main stairs which bridges a road and has an escalator beside it, though I don't know why. Is there a beer hall up there? It was mostly guys in suits, although since the other side is government buildings, maybe there's a path that's more convenient than walking around.

What I actually got was this:

which is chocolate mousse, raspberry ganache, and lychee cream, called Dahlia (ダリア), which I think is 669 yen. The outer fruit coating is about the right consistency, not too sticky and the inside lychee cream, though lacking a distinct taste, balances the mousse. This was not wow-this-is-great good, but well balanced and excellent quality. Still not sure whether Libertable is a great cake shop, but it's in the running. It's got the ambiance and prices, and it is convenient enough that I'll try again..

Running and Patisserie Noix de Beurre fraise chantilly

Today I got cake first, from Noix de Beurre (ノワドゥブール at Isetan. The fraise chantilly (フレーズ・シャンティ) is basically a French short cake, only they don't dump the cream on it and add the strawberry on top and side until you order it (although it was still a couple hours before I ate it). It is 648 yen, so it is relatively expensive for their things. They are basically an in-house unit of Isetan rather than an outside shop like many of the counters there. I'm not a big fan of short cake, but this is great cake from a great shop. Plus just this cake was enough to make me feel very full after running (which does not tend to expand my stomach), probably because of all the cream, although I recovered in a hour for pizza, no problem.

Before eating it, I went for the run, which is a little dangerous, because my motivation is weaker and I wonder why do I run, can I just give it up forever now? After some warm-up running, I did my first lap around the Meiji Jingu Gaien, near where I usually start, and that problem was solved. I stopped between laps (all I had to time myself was my flip phone). Did 7:13, 6:30, and 6:27 times and thought, "Eh, I have to go again?" (since I hadn't gotten my best yet) and decided I wasn't going around a fourth time today. The track is just short of 1.4 km, so not that long but not a sprint. Next I jogged over to Akasaka Palace and did a lap around that in 18:54 as a benchmark for future runs. Apparently, it is 3.3 km around, plus it's not a flat course, so even if you don't do +5 km first, it's more challenging. If the weather holds (and they're warning that it may not be safe out in the evening), then I'll try a hill-focused run tomorrow.

Pastry Shop (Hyatt Regency Tokyo): Rouge Noir

No running (although I walked quite a bit). I went to Pastry Shop, which is in the Hyatt Regency Tokyo shop, and got a Rouge Noir for 572 yen. Along the lines of "I never learn", this is another chocolate mousse with raspberry cake, and again, I was not that into it, although it was cheaper, more elaborate, and tastier than yesterday's from Le Pain Quotidien, which is good to know except that I probably won't need it again unless I develop a renewed strong taste for chocolate mousse. Also I don't learn that mousse is fragile, as it seriously is leaning to the rear from damage.

I also visited Rue des Briques, but decided that it did not look that great, so I didn't get anything. It's pretty small. There are a lot of restaurants in that hotel, so maybe there are more customers than I saw, but it did not look like it did a lot of business, although there was another person in there and it was near closing time (7 pm). Maybe checking out other hotel pastry shops is not such a good method for finding good cake.

24 km to Quatre: ruban, tarte fraise, cassis

Actually, I overshot my west-east turn around and turned too soon and ended up reversing for the east-south turn, so maybe it was more like 25 km, but then I actually start earlier than I up on the maps and Google is not exact on the distance, so who knows.

It was an okay run, though I need to simplify the turns, because I'm not up for complex navigation after about half way and I might be reaching my limit, but not so much that I couldn't walk home. The end point is in front of Quatre. No pictures, sorry: photographer camera preparation failure. Also, I purchased foolishly, so no need to document that. The Ruban is 432 yen and is chocolate with praline cream (almonds). Basically, it's a standard little rectangle with layers of cake, cream, and mousse. The cake was soft sponge, though, and something harder would have been better, I think. I should eat these thing in the shop or take them home and bring their temperature down rather than eat in a hot park, but in any case, my impression is that it was not so great. Cassis (black currant) is a popular flavor in Japan, so I decided to try the so named cake for 420 yen, just as a change, but it was a mousse cylinder with a layer of fruit gelatin on top and the cylinder was kept in shape by a clear plastic ring that one could not just peal off like on the other cakes, so I had to sort of eat out from the middle, which was messy. The taste did not justify the engineering shortcomings. Finally the Tarte Fraise was a cut wedge of strawberry tart for 475 yen, and it was actually good as tarts go and I appreciated it more than the other two, but I prefer more a tartlet, so I don't need to ever go back. Maybe the bread is good, and they sold various other things, quiche, hamburgers, chocolates, and cookies. It was pretty full service.

In that neighborhood, Gakugei Daigaku (University) Station area, I recommend instead Rue de Passy for fancy French cakes (though not quite great, I've had better things there than at Quatre) or if you want something more American (if cream cheese based icing with sponge cake is American), then I recommend Matterhorn, which was doing a good business, as always. That's two shops in a row that I chose without recommendations that did not work out, so the next two should be ones that I've sampled from Isetan, which I can manage from recent visits. Nevertheless, I jotted down the name of a place I ran past for future reference, Lettre d'Amour, so maybe I will try there next as an unknown place.

Bad cake makes be crave better cake. I considered Maison du Chocolat on Aoyama Street near Omotesando Station, because I've never bought cake there, perhaps because it is expensive and the explanations generally only include common ingredients like butter, flour, and egg (but also gelatin), although they are little chocolate layer cakes. I went with Le Pain Quotidien [Which has since closed at this location, Kitaaoyama, Minato-ku] and got the raspberry chocolate mousse (ラズベリーチョコレートムース) for something like 600 yen. I know, mousse again, and the base was sponge, but it was fine, better than the earlier cakes, although not great. I think I've had better there. I'll have to try again to get great cake tomorrow perhaps from the unhelpfully named Pastry Shop. As you can see, the cake got a little beat up. There was a cardboard spacer with an ice pack, but neither the cake nor the spacer was taped down. I don't know what she had been planning to do with the fork and napkin before I stopped her. 

10+ km to Aux Bacchanales: Trianon

I didn't calculate the exact distance but I went through Yotsuya and up and down hills and got a little lost (although I'm not sure that I took any different path than if I had a map), so let's call it 10+ km and leave it at that. My knees were still a little sore. I think I need to start doing some speed training and sprinting rather than just hills, to break up the weekday runs. Maybe I'll try around Gaien first, since that's short. I need a loop so I don't have to stop for lights (which are also a danger to life anyway). I suppose I'll use my flip phone to time. Now I'm interested in the iWatch, or whatever it is, but I'm sure the price will cure me of that.

So the goal (successfully reached, and still no rain) was Aux Bacchanales. This is more of a cafe (a busy one), and not every branch has regular cake, but the Ginza store does [but quit since the original post], with a separate wait person. I first ended up there when Dalloyau failed me. Before that, I mostly ignored it because (a) it seemed ubiquitous and (b) the one nearest me doesn't do most cake, just fancy bread and is a big cafe/bar in a rich area. I've updated only the shops in this old map.

This is a Trianon (トリアノン). I've lost the receipt, but the website says that the cake was 515 yen, so 556 with tax. I think I paid about 550 yen, so close enough. On a dacquoise (base almond/hazelnut meringue layer: ダコワーズ) base, supposedly there is crushed crepe (フイティーヌ), praline cream, and chocolate mouse in there layers. Of course, there is chocolate coating and you can see pieces of I assume chocolate, which the official description calls fichinu (フイチーヌ), which, like much of the description, Google translate wants nothing to do with. Again, I need a Japanese-French to anything (Japanese, French, or English) dictionary to figure out what most of these terms actually mean, and it has to be flexible for the Japanese spelling, since it doesn't seem to be standardized for all terms.

This cake is a success. It's chocolate cake, with layers of mouse and layers of cream and all is chocolaty, but not overpoweringly, and the almond on top gives away that some of this is almond base. The base is moist yet a little crunchy. It is great cake, so I think of this as a great shop, and it's not their only great cake, according to memory. Comparing this shop's cake with other places' is one of my ultimate goals.

patisserie Sadaharu Aoki paris: Saya

Browsed cookbooks for French sweets, and found a couple worth getting, so now I'm going to have to decide how serious I am about it.

Then went to Aoki at Isetan and got the Saya for 830 yen (not a cheap shop). Strawberry cream dominates, although there is pistachio cream (and pistachio bits on top) and the taste of hazelnut, if I've correctly unraveled the Japanese saburenowazetto (サブレノワゼット) back to French. (An ideal cookbook would have English, French, Japanese phonetic French, and native Japanese terms all listed.) I can only taste the strawberry, but it is not too strong (although the cake is on the sweet side, suggesting that I'm really going to have to learn to get into tea), so I'm sure everything else is balancing it out to make it perfect. Even the bottom biscuit is good, of the crumbly type.

Great cake from a great shop and they gave me half a lemon macron while I was waiting, which was delicious (and would cost another 150 yen, I assume), so I'm happy, although my plan is to go somewhere cheaper next time. This is the strawberry cake to beat at this point, although there is room for different types of great strawberry cake.

I regret not centering the picture, but the strawberry pulled me left. Now if I knew which of the several settings I tried this was, I would have learned something.

10+ km to Takagi's: Arpajon

I added extra up-and-downs in Wakaba (Yotsuya) and twice on Sannou Hie Shrine (I was aiming to go up and come down the big front stairs but first ended up going up and down on the side once first), but here's the route that I had planned to follow. Looks like I went wrong at East Gaien Road halfway through the south leg. The first half was quite a work out, as was jogging up and down shrine steps, so I'll try it again the next time that I go that way, although I don't think that I can really cross the next main road where Google says I can. There are some shops further along Aoyama Road that I want to try some time (although I think I can find them elsewhere), so maybe I'll try that path in reverse. Tomorrow I need to rest (and get a package: wine), but I'll probably go over to Isetan and grab cake from Aoki or somewhere, which I haven't hit lately and is on the list of greats in my head. Thursday will depend on the rain. I'll take a cake rest then if I can't run.

Patisserie Takagi is convenient (on Aoyama Road), in terms of hours and time and has pretty good cake. I'm not sure whether it's great, but I appreciate it. Today I got the Arpajon for 605 yen, which is mostly bitter (not really so much) chocolate mousse with significant amounts of pistachio mousse and some raspberry mousse. It's got three kinds of nuts on top, which I appreciate, but is not enough to save it from being just enough chocolate mousse, which is all it's really trying to be. Some asymmetry in the chocolate spikes is due to breakage: I should bring my own bag next time, as theirs have too short a handles for good cake running. Had trouble with the camera again, apparently, but wasn't patient, so too late now. All my night photos were also fails: can't keep the camera steady enough for buildings and none of the settings for the view from the stop of the shrine stairs really gave good results.

The cake was okay, but too much mousse for me again. That's about what I expected, but it's their #1 seller (it's pretty, so no surprise; I hate when I ask a shop person what is good or what they recommend and they tell me what's the most popular, as if that proved anything) and I wanted to confirm what it's like and get Takagi listed in this blog, since they are at least on my list of ones that I want to run through their complete line-ups and compare, just I won't be needing this cake again.